ALL ABOUT VERTIGO!

It came across strange initially when I said that the world around was spinning and that my entire room seems to be in constant motion. Basically I used to find the floor of my bedroom, the bed and the room itself was in constant motion (not literally spinning or in constant motion, but I felt that way). I had to walk around supporting myself using the wall, furniture, in fact anything that was close by, and if nothing was available literally crawl. Finally, I was diagnosed with something called Vertigo.

Vertigo is the feeling that you or your environment is moving or spinning. It differs from dizziness in that vertigo describes an illusion of movement. When you feel as if you yourself are moving, it’s called subjective vertigo, and the perception that your surroundings are moving is called objective vertigo.

A few causes and types of Vertigo are:

Benign Paroxysmal Postional vertigo: Tiny calcium particles called canaliths clamp up in the canals of the inner ear. This could also be caused due to sudden movement of the head resulting in dislodgement of the crystalline structures in the ear’s balance detectors.

Meniere’s Disease-This is an inner ear disorder caused by changing pressure of the ear and built up of fluid in the ear.

Labrynthitis-Inner ear viral/bacterial infection

Bleeding in the brain:

Vertigo can be caused by decreased blood flow to the base of the brain. Bleeding into the back of the brain (cerebellar hemorrhage) is characterized by vertigo, headache, difficulty walking, and inability to look toward the side of the bleed. The result is that the person’s eyes gaze away from the side with the problem. Walking is also extremely impaired.

Some other less evident causes: Head or neck injury.

Stroke/tumor/diabetes mellitis/Atherosclerosis

Migraine

Certain medications

Hormonal fluctuations in menopausal women

Most common symptoms are: Spinning, loss of balance, headache, sweating, nausea, and yes I have experienced all of this at one go.

Treatment for Vertigo : Treatment depends mainly on what’s causing it. There are a variety of treatments for vertigo including self-care remedies, medications, and physical therapy maneuvers.

Let us look at some of the treatments

Benign Paroxysmal Postional Vertigo- Posture correction exercises, head and neck strengthening exercises help this type of vertigo. It has helped me too. Apart from this Vitamin D supplementation may be beneficial for patients diagnosed with benign paroxysmal positional vertigo. But, before that you need to check if you have a Vitamin D deficiency.

Meniere’s disease andLabrynthitis- These two are usually treated with anti-inflammatory and diuretic medicines. However, natural foods like ginger root and Curcumin aid speeding up the recovery process.

Avoiding red meats, packaged and preserved foods like frozen meats like salamis and sausages, various sauces, chips and wafers (foods high on sodium) and replacing them with fatty fish and lean meats can improve both vertigo or any of the cardiovascular and lifestyle diseases mentioned above.

About Saaimah Parkar

Saaimah Parkar has a long list of degrees. She is a bachelor Home Science, a Msc Cardiovascular rehabilitation and has a post graduate diploma in sports science and nutrition. Thanks to all her degrees and knowledge in Nutrition counselling, preparing weight loss/gain diet charts, Management of Diabetes and PCOD/PCOS she has done her internship at the Asian Heart Institute before gaining experience of working at some of the leading fitness centres. Her job profile entailed prescribing weight loss and weight gain diets to clients apart from paying special attention towards those clients who were suffering from hypertension, diabetes mellitus, hypercholesterolemia and PCOD/PCOS. A black belt in Taekwondo she believes that overall good health can be achieved through a holistic approach and not through dieting or exercising alone. According to her natural foods have great healing powers. She has also researched well on the role of garlic in heart disease. Her other interests lie in experimenting with recipes and coming up with healthier versions, gardening and feels that every person should have a plant associated with them as it contributes to your share of oxygen to the environment. With regard to her own fitness, Parkar likes to run and practicing Taekwondo as it gives her lot of confidence to defend herself. Finally, to distress she practices yoga.

2 years back
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